Back in 1977, NASA collected a variety of natural Earth sounds, greetings spoken in different languages, and music from all around the world. The purpose? To send up into space on Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. There were only 12 copies of the collection of sound created, but there are about to be a lot more.
The Voyager Golden Record is going to be mass produced for the entire world to listen to. The original 12 copies of the collection were put on large, gold-plated copper disks, but this collection will be on a much simpler, but quite suiting, gold vinyl. The 3xLP set will arrive next year in honor of the 40th anniversary of the Voyager launches.
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The original discs were collected as a way to communicate with other lifeforms, if either of the Voyager probes were to ever come across any. The aliens could get a decent idea of what life was like back in 1977, and perhaps, throughout history up until that point. The project was spearheaded by Carl Sagan – who did not get one of the original 12 discs, by the way.
The Earth release of this collection has come to be thanks to a Kickstarter started by Boing Boing editor and Institute For The Future research director David Pescovitz. It will include not just the discs, but a book containing images that were also sent up into space. It will be as if we are the aliens, finally stumbling across Voyager.
It’s finally time to see what the 1970’s thought aliens should know about Earth. As for Voyager, so far, 1 and 2 are just sitting in interstellar space waiting for just the right music fan to come upon them.
[H/T Stereogum]
